Connecticut Voters Back Assisted Suicide Bill Almost 2-1

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Connecticut voters support allowing doctors to legally prescribe lethal drugs to help terminally ill patients end their own lives, a Quinnipiac University poll released today finds.

Connecticut voters support allowing doctors to legally prescribe lethal drugs to help terminally ill patients end their own lives, a Quinnipiac University poll released today finds.

"Public support for allowing assisted dying in Connecticut is a very personal issue, crossing partisan, gender and age lines," Douglas Schwartz, director of the Quinnipiac University poll, said in a statement.

Quinnipiac also found voters to be closely divided on whether they would ask a doctor to help them take their own life. Thirty-nine percent said no in all cases, while 33 percent said they would if they were terminally ill and another 12 percent would if they were terminally ill and in pain.

On another emotional issue, Connecticut voters favor the death penalty 57 percent to 34 percent when asked a simple "favor or oppose" question.

However, voters are divided 47 percent to 47 percent on whether they approve or disapprove of a 2012 law that replaces the death penalty with life in prison with no chance of parole.

Women approve the new law 50 to 43 percent, while men disapprove 52 - 43 percent.

"Support for the death penalty has dropped 10 points in three years, from a high of 67 percent to a low of 57 percent. Perhaps this is a case of opinion following policy, as Connecticut abolished the death penalty in 2012," Schwartz said. "As we've seen in our past polls on the death penalty, when voters are given the choice of the death penalty or life in prison with no chance of parole, support for the death penalty drops. When asked the question this way, voters are evenly divided."